LLMs Are Not as Complex as You Think: Here Are 10 Strategies To Improve AI Visibility - Moz

LLMs Are Not as Complex as You Think: Here Are 10 Strategies To Improve AI Visibility

Optimizing for answer engines

1. What changes can a brand make in its content to increase its chances of LLM citations?

LLM systems are not as complex as everyone is making them out to be. The sensationalizing needs to stop, because the answer is simpler than most people want to admit.

Instead of answering queries or questions, you’re now answering conversations. Keep this in mind when creating content, and you will get cited more often than you think.

LLMs love digestible content formats like FAQs, listicles, and bullet points because they’re easy to retrieve. If your content is clearly structured and directly relevant to the prompt, it picks it up and surfaces it. If the model has to work to understand what you are saying, it moves on.

However, Domain Authority still matters, as do the fundamentals like meta titles and technical SEO. But with LLMs, the most important thing you can do is make your content easier to read because clarity outranks almost everything else.

2. What does query fan-out mode look like in practice, and how can we apply this concept to topical authority?

Liv Day, SEO Lead, Digitaloft:

Query fan-out is how AI systems like LLMs and Google's AI Mode retrieve and present information.

Traditional search is straightforward; you type best running shoes, and Google scans its index for pages that match the query or something semantically similar.

Query fan-out takes that same search and splinters it into multiple sub-queries, like:

Then, it presents what it determines as the best answer across all of them.

The implication for topical authority is that you’re not optimizing for a single keyword. You need visibility across all sub-queries that could branch from your core topic.

3. Walk us through your process for optimizing existing content for AI search visibility

Charlie Marchant, CEO, Exposure Ninja:

According to AirOps research, 85% of AI citations come from third-party sources. Your on-site content matters, but it’s one piece of a larger pie.

Start by identifying which pages on your site are most likely to surface in AI answers. If you work in SaaS, people are comparing you to competitors through entities like pricing, benefits, and features. That means your pricing page is probably more important for LLM visibility than your blog.

Next, execute these steps:

  1. Prompt research
    Analyze what content surfaces for the queries you care about. You can do this manually in a spreadsheet, but Moz has a prompt research tool to speed it up.

  2. Competitive analysis
    Compare how you appear against your competitors. Understand whether you're coming across as premium, cheap, or best value, and if the positioning aligns with your intent. Next, identify which parts of your content LLMs reference and whether those are the parts you want cited.

  3. Page structure
    Once you know what needs to change, restructure the page so it surfaces the content you want. That means rewriting paragraphs, updating headings, and refining the questions you answer. It also means updating schema so LLMs surface what you want them to.

AI citations

4. What makes a citation valuable from a content and brand POV?

Rejoice Ojiaku, Senior Content Specialist, Wise:

Getting cited doesn't automatically make a citation valuable. If it's not building authority, credibility, or driving traffic, then it’s not working for you.

There are three ways to evaluate a valuable citation:

  1. Citation source
    Just as Domain Authority matters in traditional SEO, the authority of the citation source matters in LLM systems. A mention from a reputable publication carries more weight than one from a low-quality blog.

  2. The context of the citation
    Is your brand being positioned as a source of truth, or just another option? Citation depth matters because our brains are wired to treat whatever appears first as the most important.

  3. Narrative alignment
    Consider what the model is saying about you and the relevance to the prompt. LLMs hallucinate and miss out on important context. A citation that misrepresents your brand or links to the wrong page could do more harm than good.

5. Most AI citations now come from third-party sources. How much of search visibility is still about your website versus your wider online reputation?

Liv Day:

Both are still very important, but they serve different purposes.

On-site content handles brand queries. If someone searches for your opening hours or pricing, the model pulls the information from your site, so make sure your content is accurate and well-structured.

Off-site is becoming more important. For objective queries like "HubSpot vs Pipedrive," LLMs look at information from both brands but lean heavily on third-party comparisons.

6. AEO tools now track brand mentions and competitive positioning. Which metrics do you consider most valuable?

Rejoice Ojiaku:

Focus on metrics that measure influence, specifically traffic and visibility from answer engines.

Below are three metrics that tell this story far better than anything else:

  1. Share of LLM
    Use a tool like Moz Prompt Suggestions to build a prompt list relevant to your brand and track those prompts in your AI visibility dashboard to understand how often you appear in the answers.

  2. Citation frequency and consistency
    Track how often you are mentioned in each LLM system. You might be performing better on ChatGPT than on Gemini or Perplexity.

  3. Source mixture
    This is the metric I find most revealing. If the majority of your citations come from third-party sources, it tells you that AI systems trust others rather than you.

Brand strategy for AI visibility

7. How should brands respond when Google controls discovery and also competes for attention?

Olabinjo Adeniran, Founder, Growth Case Studies:

Google is referencing its own ecosystems, and YouTube is the clearest example. Brands need to invest in video content, whether that's working with creators, partnering with influencers, or publishing branded content on your channel.

Charlie Clark, CEO, Minty Digital:

Focus on content that produces information gain. Most content summarizes existing knowledge, which LLMs already do. If you want to earn third-party mentions and disseminate content in a zero-click world, I’d advise you to invest in original research and net-new knowledge.

8. Profound's report shows that LinkedIn is now the most-cited domain for professional queries. How can brands use LinkedIn to get more LLM citations and improve Brand Authority?

Charlie Marchant:

First, find the right voices in your company. Start with employees who already post on LinkedIn or are interested in building a personal brand.

9. AI models can sometimes misrepresent a brand, which hurts visibility and conversions. How do you spot misrepresentation in AI answers, and what can you do to fix it?

Charlie Marchant:

The first step is confirming whether LLMs are misrepresenting you. Large enterprise brands tend to care because they have specific adjectives and positioning statements they're protecting.

10. If you had extra budget in 2026, where would you invest it for long-term LLM visibility?

Emma-Jane Stogdon, Organic Content Manager, Wise:

Invest in offline visibility to increase Brand Authority. The brands winning in LLMs are the ones people talk about offline, and it goes beyond search optimization.

Conclusion: You need an integrated strategy to win AI visibility

Remove silos within your internal marketing teams. Ensure consistent messaging across platforms and invest in a multi-channel approach to maximize visibility.